Third Sunday after the Epiphany
January 26, 2025
Nehemiah 8:1-3, 5-6, 8-10

The livestream of this service is available on the Trinity YouTube Channel. The audio of this sermon is available here.

It was the only thing the people were talking about. All the leaders had gathered, at a precarious moment in the life of their country. They gathered at a special place, to pray, to hear the Word of God, and to rededicate themselves. To begin a new chapter in the life of the people. One person stood to speak, and it put everyone on edge. 

It is not often that we read from the Old Testament book of Nehemiah on Sunday mornings. In fact, we only read from it once every three years. And that’s today. And the scene it describes is just that – a gathering at a sacred place, the reading of scripture, and a rededication. And everyone, everyone was talking about it.

First things first – in the year 586 B.C., the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem, and indeed the whole city, was destroyed by the Babylonians. Many of the people living there were taken to captivity in Babylon. Then, in the year 539 B.C., Babylon itself was destroyed by the Persians under Cyrus the Great. And Cyrus allowed the Jewish people, living in Babylon, to return to Jerusalem. They were allowed to go home, to rebuild their Temple, to rebuild their lives.

This is where our reading for today picks up. The people are back home, the city is being rebuilt, the Temple is under construction. And they have a ceremony. They want to dedicate themselves, dedicate their city to the Lord God. They want to mark this as a new chapter. This is how the reading from Nehemiah begins: “All the people gathered together into the square before the Water Gate. They told the scribe Ezra to bring the book of the law of Moses, which the Lord had given to Israel. Accordingly, the priest Ezra brought the law before the assembly, both men and women and all who could hear with understanding.” (Nehemiah 8:1-2a). All the people; both men and women; all who could hear with understanding. Everyone was there. And they gathered at the Water Gate in Jerusalem. That was intentional. That was a place where even the ritually defiled citizens could go. You did not have to be pure to be there. All the people.

And so the Ezra reads. And the people worship the Lord God. He reads what we call the Old Testament. Ezra reads from early morning until midday. Don’t you ever complain about our church services being too long. 

But the people don’t really get it. So as Ezra read from the law of God, other teachers interpreted. “They gave the sense, so that the people understood the reading” (Nehemiah 8:8). Then afterwards, the leaders tell the people to go on their way and have a meal in celebration (Nehemiah 8:10a). It is a new chapter in their lives.

Now, what happened at the Water Gate all those centuries ago, is pretty much what we do today. All the people are welcomed to gather – men and women, anybody who can get here. And then, we hear the words of scripture. Those words usually don’t make much sense, so somebody has to give the interpretation. That’s the sermon. And then we have communion, we go to brunch, and check on the people who we didn’t see in church. Or, as Nehemiah says, the people “eat the fat and drink sweet wine and send portions of them to those for whom nothing is prepared.” Two thousand five hundred years separate us from Nehemiah, and yet, things don’t really change.

There’s one more little thing in here, though. After hearing the words of scripture, after gathering for prayer, standing there at the Water Gate with all the people, listen to what to what the story says – “For all the people wept when they heard the words of the law.” They wept. When they heard what they were supposed to be doing, compared to what they were actually doing, they broke down in despair. They realized the distance separating them from God’s holiness and their sinfulness. And they grieved over themselves. 

Like a church full of good Episcopalians, we hear the gospel of Jesus, we hear the good news, we hear our Lord’s instructions to love God and love neighbor and what do we do in response? We drop to our knees and confess our sins, pleading with the Almighty to have mercy on us, sinners that we are. We grieve over our hardness of heart, we ask the Lord God to change us, so that we would be rededicated, made new again. Or, as Nehemiah put it, “all the people wept when they heard the words of the law.”

So today, I wish to offer you my own personal testimony. And, I hope, to share a bit of my hope for the Church – and for all the people – in this particular moment. I want to share with you the reason I read holy scriptures. I read the scriptures daily, I study the scriptures as I write my sermons; these words are always on my mind. And what I have found, more than anything, is that these words cut my heart open. I do not come to the holy scriptures to crow, or to triumph. I do not seek to justify myself or to prove my righteousness. No, I read scripture because I need to be reminded, daily, of the vast distance between God’s righteousness and my lowliness. I do not come to these words for solace only, but also for renewal. I do not read scripture to be fortified, but to be broken down. It seems nowadays that we often read scripture, and think how other people need to hear this. And that is true – but it is also true that we, each of us, as individuals, we need to hear these words, too. It seems today, that confession, that sorrow, that admitting we are wrong is one of the last things we do when we hear scripture. This is what I wish for the Church, and indeed for all the people, in this moment. That we would all come face to face with our mortality, our brokenness, and the need that each of us has for the God of love. That we would encounter this God of grace and weep.

When Ezekiel says that he will take our hearts of stone and give us hearts of flesh, I know that he is talking about me. When John the Baptist says that anybody who has two coats needs to share with someone who has none, I know he is talking about me. When Jesus talks about recovery of sight to the blind, of letting the oppressed go free, releasing the captives – he has me in mind. My blindness to human need and suffering. The weight of greed that oppresses my own capacity to give and receive grace. How I am captive to the world’s hostility. Yes, Jesus is talking about the blind, the oppressed, the captives. But it would be the height of arrogance if we did not also acknowledge how the powers of the world have blinded us, oppressed us, are holding us captive. I consider how I, too, get absorbed into the world of petty memes; I think of how I, too, have joined the rat race; I, too, scroll Facebook to see what else I should be enraged about. I’m blind, oppressed, and captive. And so I weep. 

Maybe what I really want to say, is that when the people gather to hear the words of scripture, when we gather for prayer and worship, when we gather to rededicate ourselves, I hope that God would move us to grieve, and yes, to confess our need for God’s grace. What I hope is that the words of scripture would examine us, challenge us, expose our darkened hearts to the light of God’s love. And I hope that for all the people, myself first and foremost.

That, I believe, is the way to this vision of unity that Saint Paul lays out for us. The Body of Christ. We are made one Body because we have all been broken down by the glorious weight of God’s grace, and by the same grace we are being rebuilt, day by day. Unity comes not by everybody being the same, or by everybody thinking the same thing, or by everybody coming from the same place, but by everybody agreeing that the first thing we have in common is that we are all woefully in need of God’s mercy. And that the only way to being made complete, is by the Spirit of God putting us together. That our tears would bind us together.

So I offer these words today, knowing that for some I will have said too much, and for others I will have said too little. Be that as it may. I hope that, more than anything, we will all find that the words of scripture are difficult to hear, and that this is our opportunity to stand there, as at the Water Gate, in ancient Jerusalem. Listen, and you can hear with me the priest Ezra reading aloud the words of scripture, I can feel the grief welling up inside of me as I come to grasp the futility of my own pride. I can feel the despair of the people around me, but also the hope that the people gathered there would become one body, broken down and remade into God’s will – remade by God’s loving-kindness. And so I weep. Because I am so far from that; because we are so far from that. But like a balm for my soul, I come here; to eat the goodness, to drink the sweet wine, and to take solace in the sheer, unearned grace that the Lord God Almighty knows exactly who am I, who we all are, and yet still loves us.

Refernces

The HarperCollins Study Bible notes on Nehemiah 8 are especially helpful.